City officials reported being displeased with the progress, or rather lack thereof, being made regarding downtown Ukiah’s most talked-about building for decades, the Palace Hotel.
“We have continued to reach out to the owners and agents of the building, and continue to be dissatisfied with the lack of progress,” Deputy City Manager Shannon Riley told the Ukiah City Council Wednesday during its latest regular meeting. “So, there is no formal change in the status or anything else at this time, however, we will be discussing further in closed session this evening.”
When asked after the meeting if she could share any more details regarding what was discussed, Riley said she “could not discuss closed session items,” adding only that “Jitu Ishwar is still the owner and we still have a demolition permit pending additional information.”
As for updates on active construction in the city, Public Works Director Tim Eriksen told the City Council changes had been made after the significant traffic impacts experienced earlier in the week.
“If you were lucky enough to be downtown (Tuesday or Wednesday), you know that traffic was not amazing on either Perkins or Gobbi streets,” Eriksen said, telling the City Council that staff were “working with Ghilotti to fix that, and it should be much better, honestly, as this week continues. One of the problems was they had the intersection of (East Gobbi Street and South Orchard Avenue) closed, so that required people coming down (Gobbi) to go back into town, so it just kind of siphoned this disaster, (but) we fixed that (Wednesday), and traffic was much better this morning.
“So we appreciate everyone’s patience with this,” Eriksen continued, urging residents to stay away from construction areas as much as possible, and reminding them that: “Less than a year from now, we’ll have all new streets in all three of those places, and all new utilities, and so it will be a very nice (final) product, but it is painful as they are doing it right now.”
Some of that construction was described in a city press release as “work to replace the sewer lines, beginning this week on East Gobbi Street, starting at South Orchard Avenue and moving west to State Street. East Gobbi will have one-lane closures on blocks with active construction; in those areas, traffic will be allowed westbound only. This will, at times, impact MTA’s ability to access the Northbound Local 9 bus stops: Co-op, Autumn Leaves, the Ukiah Post Office, Social Security and Big Lots. MTA will need to reroute the Northbound Local 9 during the hours of construction for affected areas; other traffic will be detoured as well. Thus, neighborhoods in the areas of Waugh Lane, Cooper Lane, Betty Street and Marlene Street should anticipate additional traffic during construction hours.”
Q. What are the construction hours?
A. Monday-Friday, 7 a.m. – 5 p.m.
Q. Where will lane closures occur?
A. Lane closures will only occur on blocks where there is active construction. The first area will be between Orchard Avenue and Leslie Street. From there, construction will move west toward State Street. At this time, it is unknown how much time will be spent on each section.
Q. Will any traffic be allowed in the construction areas?
A. Yes, but only westbound in those areas.
Q. What about emergency and delivery vehicles?
A. Construction crews will always allow emergency and delivery vehicles through. Residents will also have access at all times.
Q. Why westbound only?
A. The sewer lines are on the south side of the street. Unfortunately, Gobbi Street isn’t wide enough to accommodate active construction plus two lanes of traffic.
Q. Will Gobbi Street be repaved after this?
A. Yes. Once the utility and concrete work is complete, Gobbi will be reconstructed.
Q. What about Main Street?
A. Gobbi, Main and Perkins are all part of one large project called the Urban Core Rehabilitation and Transportation project. Main Street is also having utilities replaced and then will be completely reconstructed. Perkins Street will have storm drains added and be repaved. For more info about this project, see www.cityofukiah.com/ucrt
(Ukiah Daily Journal)
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